Field of the Invention
The present disclosure relates to a destaticizing brush and an image forming apparatus including the same.
Description of the Related Art
In image forming apparatuses such as a copier, a printer, and a facsimile machine, a destaticizing brush is used to reduce or remove static electricity charged on a sheet.
There is a destaticizing brush in which a brush material formed of an arrangement of a plurality of pieces of electroconductive fiber is pinched with an aluminum tape and one side of an adhesive surface of a conductive two-sided adhesive tape so as to integrally form a unit. The other adhesive surface of the conductive two-sided adhesive tape is adhered to a conductive holding member such as a metal plate such that the destaticizing brush unit is held therewith and is grounded, through a grounding member, by being in electric contact with a grounding portion such as a side plate.
Generally, adhesiveness of a conductive two-sided adhesive tape is weak. Accordingly, the two-sided adhesive tape may come off when a conveyed sheet and the destaticizing brush come in contact with and slide against each other. As a measure of the above, the destaticizing brush unit and the holding member may be nipped with a nip member so that the two-sided adhesive tape does not come off. However, the structure will become complex and a number of components will be used causing the destaticizing brush to become costly. Furthermore, since conductive two-sided adhesive tapes are expensive and prices of copiers, printers, facsimile machines, and the like are required to be reduced, a destaticizing brush having a simple and inexpensive configuration is in need.
For example, in Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2002-8890, a destaticizing unit is proposed in which a destaticizing brush main body portion is adhered to a grounding plate with a non-conductive adhesive tape and in which a destaticizing brush that is inserted into an opening provided in the grounding plate comes in electric contact with a wall surface of the opening at a uniform pressure.
However, in the destaticizing unit of Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2002-8890, a contact failure may occur due to aged deterioration of the destaticizing brush weakening the pressure pressing the wall surface of the opening of the grounding plate.